1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a device for providing dough products with a topping material.
2. Description of Related Art
Devices for arranging toppings on a dough product are known. U.S. Pat. No. 4,197,794 discloses a pizza topping device to apply ingredients to a pastry shell. Pastry shells are covered with a sauce and toppings are applied to the sauced pastry shell from above. The pizza toppings are mixed and arranged to be applied in a layer with a pre-selected depth.
In general, these systems run continuously, even when there is no pastry shell to be covered with toppings and sprinkled toppings on an empty factory line are lost. When excess toppings are fed back to the system they tend to clog up the supply of toppings, resulting in dense balls of toppings that cannot be spread evenly over the dough products. All in all the fresh toppings are not applied effectively and evenly to the dough product which results in unnecessary deterioration of these products.
It is therefore a goal of the present invention to provide a device for providing dough products with a topping material, that takes away the above disadvantages, and/or to provide a useful alternative to the state of the art.